Young people should undertake a "conscription-type" year instead of staying on at school until they are 18, Ben Fogle has said.

Speaking to lifestyle magazine Calibre, the adventurer and TV presenter said that he would allow children to spend a year either in the military or doing other voluntary service.

He said: "If I went into politics - which I wouldn't, because it's a thankless task, but I've dabbled with the thought of it - I would scrap the education system's insistence that everyone must do something up to age 18, turn it to 17, and that one year would become a voluntary service year.

"It would be a conscription-type year. You could spend a year either working in the NHS, or travelling with a purpose, doing some kind of aid work.